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Bears, cougars in United States cities?

Yosemitemountain lion appears to be treed by two coyotes. In fact what is going on is a mother mountain lion distracting the coyotes from her two cubs. The mother mountain lion and her cubs were feeding on a deer in the Ahwahnee Meadow when the coyotes arrived on the scent.

Americans have been moving from the country to the city for decades, so maybe it’s not surprising that researchers are finding a similar pattern among other North American apex predators.

New research suggests mountain lions and bears may be following the urban pioneering of raccoons, foxes and, most notably, coyotes as they slowly encroach on major US metro areas from New Jersey to California. In the case of coyotes, they don’t even mind the density, with some coyote packs now confining themselves to territories of a third of a square mile.

“The coyote is the test case for other animals,” Ohio State University biologist Stan Gehrt told EcoSummit 2012 conference on Friday in Columbus, Ohio. “We’re finding that these animals are much more flexible than we gave them credit for and they’re adjusting to our cities. That’s going to put the burden back on us: Are we going to be able to adjust to them living with us or are we not going to be able to coexist?

Cougars survived the late Pleistocene extinction because they’ll eat just about anything meaty: here.

Mountain lions in southern California are facing an uncertain future as urbanisation forces them to live in isolated groups, and suffer a severe loss of genetic diversity: here.